There and Back Again
by CampionSayn
Summary: There are times when, despite everything that might have happened, you have to go home and try to set something right.


Title: There and Back Again  
>Summary: There are times when, despite everything that might have happened, you have to go home and try to set <em>something<em> right.  
>Disclaimer: I don't own the Prince of Egypt, but I commend the people who made and own it.<p>

Written in response to the reviews of my last tPoE fic. I was feeling grateful and this spilled out.

* * *

><p>"…<em>Moses…Moses!"<em>

An echo swayed to and fro on the waves, perhaps trying to pass a message upon the blue from one end to the other to the only person among the Hebrews that had gone back after everyone had made camp near the mountains.

Holding his staff like it had become a part of himself over the course of the many days since his Lord had bestowed it upon him, Moses stood upon the shoreline. The rocks and sand under his feet moved with his added weight upon them, but not by all that much.

Moses had a saddened look upon his face, eyes surveying the wide expanse of water, trying to make out land again.

He wanted to see his brother.

The staff in his hand seemed-as it always had just before something important was to happen—to flux and groan and become warm under his palm, and he brought it before him, though he did not look at it. He instead looked up into the heavens, at the sky that was turning a large amount of contrasting colors to follow after the sun and retreat from the moon that brought with it the dark black color as well as the many stars that sailors and nomads lived by.

There was a whispering along his ears and a breeze and he knew what to do.

Gently, Moses set the staff just upon the surface of the water, his eyes looking from the blue waves and then back across the expanse to where the land came up again. Where his brother was.

Under the staff's touch, the water bowed under and then up well over the savior of the Hebrews' head, clearing into a dome sort of entrance. This was perhaps what a rabbit warren would look like if a human were ever allowed such an experience; Moses could see the tunnel continuing onward and see the ground, touch in under his feet.

He took the first step, and then another. As he went forward, he didn't notice the water close where he entered and seal, his staff illuminating his way forth.

* * *

><p>His back hurt. Really, very and with a tremendous feeling of having all the world plus a few others perched atop his spine and weighing him down, causing his forehead to lean all the way down and touch the stone he had crash landed on with the wave that had killed all of his soldiers. But, it hadn't killed Rameses.<p>

For all of his hurt and wounded pride, he couldn't understand why he was the only one spared.

His right hand scraped at the rock, some of the skin at the tips of his fingers being torn and bleeding, leaving small, red blotches along their path, back and forth. But, Rameses couldn't feel it.

He was just…numb.

He had actually broken down into nothing but sobbing hours ago, when he had called out for Moses and had gotten no reply. He wasn't expecting anything, but something broke even more inside him and twisted, leaving him a wreck atop the rock. Now, tear streaks along his face, he couldn't even breathe very well. There were no tears left, just the eternal feelings of loss, perhaps enhanced by the sky completely black, save for the stars decorating it like billions of glaring, horrendous eyes looking with disappointment at him. He had a vague thought that somewhere his father's eyes were among them.

But, he was just too tired to care.

Somewhere along the shoreline, some of the horses that had fled earlier before the wave crashed gave a series of loud neighs and knickers. Despite himself, Rameses allowed his head to rise up from its bowed position and blinked at the water.

There was a glowing light shining under the blackened blue wetness and in the back of his mind the pharaoh had a thought. Perhaps it was a spirit from the afterlife come to bid him hello and escort him to be judged by Anubis.

Remembering himself, Rameses got up from leaning upon his hands and stood in a sitting position. He wasn't sure if he should be afraid…he didn't feel afraid, but he was too tired to tell. Just…exhausted.

The horses scattered away, bounding well over the hill they had come from like dear and the glow from the water slowly came to a peak, the water building up like a dome and amassed to a good eight feet tall; most definitely an apparition.

The water, in a final upward surge, opened at the top of the glow and then spread downwards, revealing to Rameses the man he had grown up with, apart from and then far away from. The water lapped away from Moses and the leader of the Hebrews stepped forward, quietly and… He didn't look as sure of himself as he had when the two of them were younger.

He was looking down at the sand and the waters lapping about and away from his toes, dark eyes flickering about and he wasn't quite breathing. Not properly, anyway. To the contrary, he was sort of hyperventilating and his grip on the staff was unsettling and white knuckled. Rameses nearly asked him what was wrong, he was so out of it from that fall and emotional turmoil.

Actually, when Moses finally tried to survey his surroundings, and made eye contact with his brother, Rameses had this unfortunate feeling of bile, despair and unbearable hatred rise up all at once and managed to slide off of the stone and onto his feet; tall, proud and walking forward.

"Rameses," Moses started, trying to form a reason for his coming back. But he didn't get far as Rameses stopped anything Moses might have continued with by slamming his fist into the younger brother's jaw, sending him sideways into the sand, the staff falling into the water. There was blood dropping from a split in his lip he didn't even feel after the impact.

Moses let his eyes close and braced his hand against the sand. He couldn't look at Rameses now, or he would start crying. Not from the blood or pain, but from the grief that he personally felt he didn't deserve to feel after…after everything that had happened.

Rameses looked down at Moses, eyes like wildfire in sagebrush and the fist he had used against the man throbbing. His teeth ground together and finally, words sprung up, angry and volatile like salt in the wounds.

"Why have you come back here? Why have you come back after what has happened? Why, Moses?"

The pharaoh kicked the Hebrew in the stomach for the first question and again for the second. For the third, he grabbed dark brown locks of hair and twisted as hard as he could; so hard that a small chunk of the hair pulled free and there was blood and skin at the ends.

Moses did not cry out, nor try to pull away or run from Rameses. He endured and despite himself and trying not to near to the point of turning red like a blazing sun or white like a corpse , tears were escaping him and he opened his eyes to look at his brother. Somewhere between trying to find an answer out of the pit of black guilt that had become him and nothing but the man hurting him because he deserved it, he found an answer to the questions in one.

"I just wanted to see if you were alive," he answered, in truth and almost too quiet to be heard. Strange after speaking so loudly for he and his people's freedom…

Shock is what made Rameses let go of the brown hair, but it is rage that fueled him into wrapping his hands—both of them strong but still bleeding from clawing at the rocks—around the man's neck and squeezing as hard as he could. It caused Moses to be much to surprised to fight back. He didn't fight back, too busy looking at those dark eyes that he had long missed when he left the palace of his first family and walked the desert, so angry and confused. They were not as he remembered them…

The oxygen was leaving him swiftly and he felt both of his hands moving to touch Rameses' arms, but not grab them. He was pretty sure that he was falling slowly backwards, those hands still around his neck and Rameses moving to his knees to steady himself with his knees on either side of Moses and making twin marks in the sand.

Moses felt as well as saw black along his vision, before there was such a sound of blood in his ears that he got one last real look at his brother before his eyes rolled back in his head and unconsciousness took its hold over him.

When there was no struggle, Rameses was happy in a disturbing way and felt that _this_was his revenge that he would actually have. Not perhaps the slaughter of the Hebrews that he had hoped for, in payment for the life of his son, but he would at least have revenge over this one-

There was a sadistic smile as the Hebrew choked for breath, when the Hebrew made to try and free himself by pushing against his arms, when there was finally no air left and the Hebrew started to fall back entirely with death… and the eyes rolled back.

_Eyes not so unlike his own when they were young and did chariot races or played tricks on the priests…  
><em>  
>The awful, demonic smile fell away from Rameses and his grip went slack; the blood from his fingers left trails along the lining of Moses' veins and were swiftly washed away when the younger man fell into the water, his head, shoulders, everything being submerged in the little waves.<p>

In a short instance, somewhere in him that was left untainted by previous days and nights and terrors, Rameses remembered the story of the god of the sun being destroyed by his brother darkness.

"No, wait," he cried, hands snatching Moses up and out of the water, around the shoulders and dragging him into land, near the stone with the blood trails in five finger digits along the top where he had sat. Some water left Moses' mouth and nose, but when Rameses set him down, he wasn't breathing.

Rameses didn't want to think of that story of darkness and the sun, and without hesitating or thinking in the least, set his mouth against the others' and forced air into them. And again and again, before moving away and pressing just above the stomach. Please, please come back, he wanted to say something…

With a little leap under the hands—palms open and seeming to no longer bleed—there was breathing and a rise of the chest. A heavy coughing racked the robed form and Rameses could not remember a time when he felt such joy after feeling such immeasurable cruelty before.

He took his hand away along with himself, backing up on his rear away from Moses as he took in breath after breath, but was still not quite ready to lift himself from his laid down position Rameses had put him in. Saving Moses from truly dying, Rameses had done, but he would not help he lift up. He was numbed up again, cold and confused and wrapped his arms around his knees not unlike a child fleeing from a nightmare. And wasn't that what this was anyway; a nightmare?

Moses lifted slowly from lying down, hand coming up to touch the forming bruises of dark red and blotted purple spots. He could taste the salt water of the sea in his mouth still, some of the liquid managing to cling to the tissue of his lungs. But, he was alive, somehow.

His eyes looked about and finally landed on Rameses.

The pharaoh spoke, words quiet and seething, "You shouldn't have come back. I should have killed you."

There was a tingling behind his eyes again, but Moses clear his throat and asked near a whisper, innocent and guilty at the same time, though it didn't have to feel like that, "Then why didn't you?"

Rameses moved to bring forth his hand and speak like his father, a command at the ready to say that Moses should stay silent lest Rameses follow through and complete what he almost had, but those damn soulful eyes were on him and his mind was again blank and recalled back to when they were brothers and had just experienced something at the same time. When they were little and innocent and nothing could tear them apart. His hand dropped back and into his lap and he closed his eyes so he didn't have to look at Moses.

"Perhaps I should ask why it was you came to see if I was alive," Rameses spoke, "Your God certainly saw to it that I almost followed the fate of my men."

"I never wanted that," Moses said, desperately getting to his knees, but too weak to get to his feet yet, "Please believe me that I never wanted anyone—especially you—to die."

An angry, bitter bark of laughter left Rameses and he got to his feet, walking to stand above and before Moses and the rather pathetic display on his hands and knees, "Oh, and why is it that I don't believe you? All of my soldiers, all the Egyptian first born, my own son, are all dead because of your trying to free those slaves! You tell me that you never wanted anyone to die! Hah!"

Moses was shaking his head back and forth, tears again in his eyes and seeping out as he looked up at Rameses, repentant and pleading, "No, no, no…"

"Stop that," Rameses spat, angrily getting down to one knee so he could slap Moses in the face, "Denial never did anyone any good."

"I…." Moses started again, but stopped, saying what had been eating at both of them and had perhaps been the root of Rameses chasing after him and the rest of the Hebrews, "I never intended for your son to die."

This was not exactly the proper thing to say and Moses found himself on his back again, Rameses knee pressing down on his abdomen, one hand clutching at the robes Moses wore and the other punching him repeated in the face, adding to the hits he had received before being choked into unconsciousness.

"Liar!"

"I didn't—" Moses tried to say, before Rameses smashed his fist and then the other across his face, before gripping at his robes and pulling their faces tremendously close, eyes like mirrors, but polarized.

"You may not have meant for any of this to happen," Rameses whispered, breathing harshly, "But it did and now you have to live with it. Now I have to live without my…"

Anything that Rameses might have continued with broke down at that thought, images of his son, alive and happy, followed by his son dead and on the slab with that sheet invading his thoughts. He felt like he was kicked in the stomach when tears left his face to be followed with his crying out.

He tried to get up, but then two hands were gripping his. Moses tried to get him to look back at him, but Rameses managed to tear away one hand and push him back. Or tried to, anyway, as Moses held firm with the other hand and the free one went to Rameses' shoulder and around; Rameses pushed and Moses pulled.

"Let me go, you-you-you,"

"Brother."

That one word allowed one last burst of anger, Rameses striking Moses at his chest as hard as he could before he broke completely and stopped resisting the hand (why did it have to be so damn comforting) on his back, pulling him against the robes and into a strong, loving hug.

Moses rested his head atop Rameses', one arm circling his brother's middle and the other set between his shoulders to rub gently at the skin as Rameses cried out his heart.

Things were not the same as they once were. Would never be likely to again, but Moses would attempt to mend what he could with this moment and contact and small words forming to be carried away by a light wind that flew over, across and along the sea like it had for centuries; the horses that would no doubt carry Rameses back to Egypt canted well away from the two brothers and the staff Moses had dropped with his brother's first assault lay unbothered in the sand. A moment frozen for a second in time when Moses spoke again, hugging his brother and his brother actually hugging back, for the moment.

"I love you, my brother," Moses whispered, feeling Rameses hitch his breath as Moses did not feel it against his throat, "I never lied about that. I'm so sorry."

He could feel a fresh onslaught of tears fall down his cheeks and onto the top of his older brother's head and just as he wanted to continue, he felt Rameses cry even more, breath gracing Moses' skin with his own tears in the robes pressed against him.

Rameses readjusted his arms and held even more tightly to his…his little brother. His brother.

"I, too, am sorry," Rameses spoke, shaking, "And…I love you, as well, brother."

Nothing else was said.


End file.
